Create safer communities by implementing and enforcing codes and standards as created by a national consensus process, especially in the WUI and under-served and vulnerable populations in rural and urban areas; and provide affordable and fire-safe housing.
Issue
State and local governments are responsible for promoting the use and enforcement of current codes and standards. The federal government can help by incentivizing compliance and providing funding to local jurisdictions for code implementation, inspection, and enforcement. This will increase fire and life safety in our communities, especially in the wildland-urban interface and among under-served and vulnerable populations.
State of Science
In the News
Resources
State of Science
- Insurance Institute for Building and Home Safety Research Center: Wildfire
- NFPA: Physical Disability as a Factor in Home Fire Deaths (March 2022)
- NFPA: Home Fire Victims by Age and Gender (December 2021)
- NFPA: Poverty and the Risk of Fire (July 2021)
- USFA: Fire in the United States 2008-2017 (November 2019)
In the News
- New York Times: The Chain of Failures That Left 17 Dead in a Bronx Apartment Fire (July 8, 2022)
- NBC 10 Philadelphia: Officials Identify 12 Victims of Deadly Fairmount Fire (January 11, 2022)
- The Atlantic: The East Coast Will Not Escape Fire (September 19, 2022)
- Sacramento Bee: Thousands return home from Mosquito Fire evacuations, as rain turns blaze to smolder (September 20, 2022)
- The Hill: Why wildfires disproportionately affect America’s poor (August 3, 2022)
Resources
- NFPA Fire & Life Safety Ecosystem™
- BuildStrong Coalition
- FEMA: Building Codes Strategy
- FEMA: Protecting Communities and Saving Money: The Case For Adopting Building Codes (November 2020)
- FEMA: Building Codes Adoption Playbook for Authorities Having Jurisdiction (August 2022)
- IAFF: Building Construction and Fire Safety Code
- NAMIC/BuildStrong Coalition: BRIC Pocket Guide
- Coalition for Current Safety Codes Toolkit
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Codes and Standards
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